


Wake Up Dead

by erintoknow



Series: Aria-Rough Drafts [27]
Category: Fallen Hero Series - Malin Rydén, Fallen Hero: Rebirth (Video Game)
Genre: Gen, Nightmares, POV Female Character, POV Second Person, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Suicide, Trans Character, Trans Female Character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-11
Updated: 2020-01-11
Packaged: 2021-02-27 08:00:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,110
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22213696
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/erintoknow/pseuds/erintoknow
Summary: Becoming a villain has only amplified your problems rather than solve them.For now.
Series: Aria-Rough Drafts [27]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1604665
Kudos: 6





	Wake Up Dead

You wake with a scream, tumbling off the couch, cracking your head against the edge of the coffee table with a ‘Thump!’ on your way down. Flashes of green before your eyes. Distantly aware of your heart pounding in your chest.

“Alex? Lord, Alex, are you okay?” The light flickers on as woman steps out of the bedroom, one hand shading her eyes as she winces against the light. Chelsea tsks as she navigates the pile of dirty clothes and library books that mark the corner of the apartment you’ve slowly taken over.

Clutching your head, you pull yourself in. Try to make yourself as small as you can. Something… remembered something but what? It’s already gone. Doesn’t feel real – already slipping out of your grasp, faster as you try to grab hold. Red and silver threads, something at your throat.

Hands find you and you strike out. Someone yells, “Ow!” the noise unheeded as panic renews; why did you do that? What are you thinking? You’re really in for it – should know better by now. How many times do the same lessons need to be learned?

“Alex, Alex, it’s okay.” You tense, can feel the intention to touch incoming but it doesn’t – no hands come near you. “You’re safe. I promise you.” Notes of worry, directed towards – not you, can’t be you, has to be something else.

You? You’ll never be safe.

Have to… have to get out of here. Have to do something. Have to move. Get out. Escape. But there are hands, holding you down under white fluorescent lights, burning spots into your vision. Something is strapped over your face, while she looks down at you. Disappointment naked on her face. “Next time, I expect results forty-two.”

* * *

It’s the strobing flashes of red and blue that pull you out of it – a shot of adrenaline sets your hands shaking as you pull yourself out of the position you’d fallen into, laying half out of your bed.

You’re not back there, and you aren’t at Chelsea’s apartment. You’re in your own. You have one of those now. An apartment. Remember?

Maybe not for long. Police lights? You clutch a hand to your aching head as you stretch out your awareness, take stock of the local minds, pick up the interlopers. Police. And… EMTs? Why? Dig deeper and your hands twist the bed sheet. Death. Someone’s dead. Footsteps in the hallway and nausea washes over you. It takes the sheer desperation of not wanting to spend a day cleaning out the bedsheets, yet again, to tamper it down. Clothes stick to your skin in a cold sweat.

The apartment next door. On the left. Young man, lived with his girlfriend – her thoughts stand out, a barbed wire coil of grief. Was paying child support. Managed a convenience store. Didn’t smoke. Didn’t drink. Now he’s dead.

How? Why?

Try to press harder for the details only to immediately snap back. Shouldn’t have asked. Shouldn’t have wondered. You’ve never been good at learning that lesson, no matter how many times, such as now, you come to regret it.

Stomach prods you with pangs of pain, vision washing out for a moment as you get to you feet. What time is it? Too early to be awake. It’s – it’s absurd, right? To think it’s your fault. His death. You weren’t even awake to do anything.

Wait!

Shit!

Jane! You were Jane and you were doing something – what? What were you doing? Can’t remember. But you were asleep, clearly. Did you fall asleep as Jane? Biting your lip you force yourself to lay down in bed, sheets still hanging half off. Close your eyes. Have to make sure you didn’t do anything stupid.

Finding Jane is getting easier and easier these days. Like there’s a cord strung between you – follow the thread and you’ll find her at the end of it.

Sink in, and it’s always touch that comes first, then everything else fills from the outside in. As if you’re water pouring into an empty vessel. Jane sits up, blinking with bleary eyes.

The dull soreness of healing bruises floats into awareness. It’s dark, with warm fabric drawn over her lower body… She’s home at her apartment. Safe. Everything’s fine. You worried for nothing. Jane glances at the alarm clock. 4 AM. Now that the danger is over, you’re free to be frustrated at this whole situation.

Nothing for it now. Four hours until meeting Ortega at the training dojo. Just thinking about it is enough to make Jane smile, a lightness in her chest. Well. if you’re going to be up this early you might as well do something productive with the time.

* * *

“So now, I’m the one stuck sorting out this mess.” Jane sighs, staring down at the water bottle in her hand, sloshing the contents in a slow circle. “Honestly, it’s not my fault the last deal fell through like that.”

Rosie takes a long drag from her cigarette, her back to you against the tree. The two of them having stepped off the park path for privacy. “Sounds like a capital-class serving of BS to me, yeah.” She stares off into the open field, chewing on thoughts your puppet isn’t privy to. “You tried looking into some of the old buildings up in the industrial park?”

Jane blinks, staring up at the tree branches above them both. “The… industrial park, huh. Hrm.”

“Yeah, like, I know you’re hoping to get somewhere more, like, central and shit, but there’s a lot of places that cleared out when the smog started getting bad. But you two-to-one you can find somewhere real cheap up that way.” She goes quiet then suddenly breaks into laughter. “And hey! That boss of yours is so paranoid anyway, right? Should be happy he gets somewhere no one in their right mind is going to go.”

Jane doesn’t respond right away. It could work. A cheaper asking price means more money free to invest back into gadgets, supplies, bribes. “Yeah, okay.” Jane “I’ll get it a look around. Thanks for the tip.”

Rosie winks, thumbs up. “Hey Janey, what are friends for?”

Jane finds herself returning the thumbs up. “Nothing legal, apparently.” That gets the barking laugh you were hoping for. Rosie slaps her leg. Jane clears her throat, gives Rosie a chance to compose herself. “Speaking of friends… You looking for another job yet?”

“You know me, I can always use more sin money.” She shuffles out another cigarette from her pack, eyes shifting between Jane and the lighter. “So… suppose I am. What'd ya got?”

Jane smiles. “I think you’ll find this one interesting.”

**Author's Note:**

> hey folks, so  
> as of writing (01/11/2020)  
> i apparently lost my mind or something i started working on revising/repackaging everything into a singular coherent fanfic rather then this loosely assembled collection of one-shots. The first one, 'Doomed From The Start' is almost done, that's like 53k words, 32 chapters. (15-16k of that is like, completely new) And then the follow-up is more nebulous but could be double that??? it really depends on where i feel the cut-off point is most appropriate, at around Green Eyes, or around Worst Hasn't Happened  
> i'm having fun doing this, and looking at this whole mess as a, like, a novel, has been v educational  
> but anyway, just in case anyone was wondering, that's why output has dropped recently. i'm still writing an absurd amount almost every day, but it'll be slower on the published updates until this is all sorted


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